Black Coast, Free City Villa.
For the past few days, Tony Stark had been staying in his Free City villa, not even returning to Stark Industries in New York once.
Tony felt very lucky. Although the land he bought wasn't expensive, it was private enough and very comprehensive, equipped with all sorts of materials and equipment. Even if Tony was building a highly technical Iron Man suit, the Free City's reserves could fully meet his needs.
Days passed, and the manufacturing of Tony's Iron Man Mark II suit was nearing its end. The Mark II was now basically formed and capable of movement.
Compared to the clumsy and ugly Mark I, the Mark II was like a exquisite diamond. It had a shape that perfectly conformed to Tony's body, and its unpainted silver metal exterior exuded the raw essence of metal, making the entire Mark II appear flawless.
Tony had just completed preliminary flight tests, so he eagerly put on the Mark II, adjusted its kinetic energy, and prepared for its first experimental flight.
"Jarvis, check the weather conditions and the automatic tool repositioning device. Monitor the airport tower channel. Prepare for the first flight!" Tony commanded the AI, Jarvis.
Jarvis responded, "Sir, the armor still needs at least 1000g of computation to enter actual flight. If we proceed now…"
"Jarvis!" Tony smiled, his expression very confident. "Sometimes, before you learn to walk, you have to learn to run. That's called growth!"
Jarvis didn't answer. He was just an AI and wouldn't understand such things, so he listened attentively, learning from Tony's words.
"Jarvis, are you ready?" Tony asked and received Jarvis's affirmative reply.
"Yes, sir."
"Good, prepare to countdown…"
"Three."
"Two."
"One."
After counting down, Tony was ready for flight, and the Mark II instantly shot up, flying out of the basement exit and soaring into the sky.
Initially, Tony had some trouble controlling the Mark II, but after a short flight, he quickly mastered the flying skills, as if he was born to fly.
Tony experimented with many things. First, he tested the Mark II's speed and found that its maximum speed was 1,800 kilometers per hour, already exceeding the speed of sound and on par with some fighter jets.
After experimenting with speed for a while, Tony began to test the Mark II's high-altitude endurance. It's important to know that the closer to the sky, the lower the air pressure. How high the Mark II could continue to fly was still an unknown.
Tony didn't hesitate. He immediately instructed Jarvis to fly upwards into the sky, wanting to see if he could break the SR-71 Blackbird reconnaissance jet's record of eighty-five thousand feet.
"Records are meant to be broken. Come on, Jarvis!"
Tony cheered for Jarvis, and the Mark II flew upwards, reaching tens of thousands of feet in altitude before long.
Then, the Mark II encountered icing issues… "Sir, if the Iron Man suit continues to fly higher, icing problems could potentially damage the armor. Should we proceed?" Jarvis's friendly voice sounded.
Tony's voice was firm and unquestionable, "Keep flying! We haven't broken the record yet!"
A moment later, the Mark II was nearing eighty-five thousand feet. Tony urged Jarvis to push harder, and finally, they successfully broke that altitude record.
But problems followed. At this point, the Mark II was completely iced over, freezing the armor's thrusters, causing the armor to lose power and begin to plummet rapidly.
"Jarvis, we're frozen! Quickly deploy the winglets, Jarvis!"
Tony grew anxious, shouting at Jarvis, wanting to escape this predicament.
Finally, just as Tony was about to crash to the ground, Jarvis recovered, restoring power to the Mark II and sending it soaring back into the sky.
"Oh, whoa…!"
Tony let out an excited roar. He had never experienced the feeling of falling from the sky like that before. It was absolutely exhilarating!
After flying for quite some time, Tony finally returned to the Free City villa. Although there was a slight error during landing that caused him to smash one of his sports cars, that wasn't the main point.
The main point was that his Iron Man suit project had succeeded. With the Mark II, his life was no longer as fragile as it had been before.
After taking off the Mark II, Tony took a shower and returned to the basement, planning to sleep there.
In the past few days, he had barely left the basement while building the Mark II, and sleeping in the basement made Tony feel very comfortable.
As he walked further in, Tony noticed something: a box and a cup of coffee. It seemed Pepper had brought them down a few days ago.
Tony pushed aside the undrinkable coffee and opened the box, finding his old, nearly depleted, and almost scrapped first-generation arc reactor that he had changed out earlier.
Seeing that Pepper hadn't thrown away the arc reactor but had kept it for him, Tony smiled, feeling comforted.
Pepper Potts, this woman, was slowly taking root in his heart!
"You have body, You give soul…"
Just then, Tony's phone rang with his favorite song, the intro to "The Futurist." (A playful jab)
The caller was Pepper. Tony sighed helplessly and answered the phone: "Hello, Pepper, you're calling me, you're not trying to persuade me to meet that Ron guy again, are you?"
"…" Having his intention revealed by Tony, Pepper was silent for a moment. She had called several times before to persuade Tony, but he still refused to meet Ron, being very stubborn.
But how could Pepper give up? So, Pepper organized some new reasons and began to persuade Tony again.
"Tony, I know you're a bit too proud to spend money to meet Ron from Osborn Industries, but think about it: if you spend money, you're the employer, and Ron is the employee. You're getting the better deal here, so what's there to be so insistent about?"
Because of the arc reactor incident earlier, Tony didn't respond to Pepper in the same tone as before, but was much gentler.
"Pepper, I haven't even said what I want to do, and that guy already proposed compensation. That clearly means I'm begging him! I, Tony Stark, have never begged anyone in my life, and I won't this time either!"
Pepper rubbed her forehead: "Tony, you're saying that again."
"Alright, Tony, I won't try to convince you anymore. Tomorrow, the Firefighters' Home in New York will be holding a charity gala. All the major companies in New York will be attending, and Ron, as a major shareholder of Osborn Industries, is very likely to be there. I'll meet him again then and try to persuade him again."
Knowing this method wouldn't work, Pepper used a tactic she had thought of earlier, a challenge. Without waiting for Tony to reply, she hung up the phone, hoping to provoke him.
"I have a lot of things to do. Bye, Tony… Beep, beep, beep~"
Hearing the dial tone from the phone, Tony's face turned a bit green. He glanced at the arc reactor in his chest, then immediately went to the bathroom and tidied up his beard, which hadn't been cleaned in days.
"No one is taking my Pepper away, hmph…"